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THE NEW YORKER, MAY 13, 2013
In order to meet Falafel, the highest-
ranked backgammon player in the
world, I took a Greyhound bus to Atlan-
tic City, and then hopped a jitney to the
Borgata Hotel. Falafel's real name is
Matvey Natanzon, but no one calls him
that, not even his mother, who calls him
Mike, the name that he adopted when
they emigrated from Israel to Buffalo---
one leg in a long journey that began in
Soviet Russia. Now even Falafel calls
himself Falafel.
Falafel was in Atlantic City to support
a friend he calls The Bone, a professional
poker player who was registered in a tour-
nament at the Borgata. The Bone, who is
from Ukraine by way of Brooklyn, used
to play backgammon, but he switched to
poker because there is more money in it.
Falafel is either a purist, or unable to mas-
ter poker, or too lazy to really try, or all
of the above. He is committed to back-
gammon, which is his main source of in-
come---to the extent that he can find
wealthy people who want to lose to him
in cash-only private games. There are
more of these than one might expect, but
not a lot. Finding them and hanging on
to them is a skill.
The jitney that travels between the At-
lantic City hotels is run-down and slow, a
horrible way to travel. Falafel would never
take it. He can make ten thousand dollars
in half an hour playing backgammon; he
can make many times that in an eve-
ning---and he can lose it all just as easily.
The money comes and goes. Currently,
he has no home. He has no driver's li-
cense. Until just a few months ago, he had
no cell phone, no bank account, and no
credit card. Pretty much everything that
he owns can fit into a large black suitcase.
Still, he allows himself certain luxuries,
and one of them is to hire a car rather than
sit in a jitney.
Falafel had promised that he would
be in the Borgata's poker ballroom, and
when I arrived, at four-thirty on a gray
January afternoon, the ballroom was half
empty. To the non-gambler, the interior
of an Atlantic City casino is in no way a
place of obvious joy. For Falafel, who
wanted to dabble in a few quick hands
while he waited for The Bone, the atmo-
sphere was energizing. He is a big man,
both in the tall way and in the overweight
way, and he was dressed to relax: a soccer
jersey with the logo of a Turkish cell-
phone company on the front, and on the
back the number seven and "FALAFEL."
Propped up on his head was a yellow knit-
ted cap, giving him the appearance of an
oversized garden gnome. Nylon shorts ex-
tended below his knees. Fiddling with a
dumpy black cell phone, he looked up,
smiling, and asked, "How did you recog-
nize me?"
Falafel is typically unshaven, but the
stubble is not forbidding, and his face eas-
ily fills with warmth. In 2005, an Israeli
filmmaker made a documentary about
him, called "Falafel's Game." In a scene
filmed late one night in his hotel, Falafel
says, "I'm like a kid inside. I feel like a
kid---in my principles, the way I think
about things." He is forty-four. He has
known hardship: he once lived on a park
bench. Pickpockets have stolen from him.
Lowlifes have taken advantage of him. He
has learned to be streetwise, but some-
thing kidlike remains. He lives life as if it
were a game.
Falafel bought three hundred dollars
in chips and sat at a table. Soon the piles
before him were getting taller. He attrib-
uted this not to his skill at poker but to
his gambling instincts, which are formi-
dable in some circumstances (backgam-
mon, mainly) and horrendous in others
(sports betting, mainly). As he played, he
glanced at the cards occasionally, but
mostly he jabbered. When an elderly
man in a leather jacket sat down and, by
coincidence, began to talk about back-
gammon, Falafel could not contain him-
self. "Oh, you play?" he said. "I like to
play, too." The man nodded. A round of
cards was dealt. "You know," Falafel said,
"I'm the No. 1 backgammon player in
PROFILES
THE CHAOS OF THE DICE
A backgammon hustler's quest to gain an edge.
BY RAFFI KHATCHADOURIAN
PHOTOGRAPH BY MICHAL CHELBIN
INSTITUTE
Falafel can make ten thousand dollars in half an hour, but he lives out of a suitcase.